Hey folks, Harry here watching Kevin Smith's JERSEY GIRL and LOVE ME IF YOU DARE... well... I've had a great 24 hours of film. I'll get into it when I get the time, for now, I must sleep to get up at dawn to see Linklater's BEFORE SUNSET! Here's Quint....
Ahoy, squirts! The crustiest of all the seaman, Quint, here with my opinion on Guillermo Del Toro's film of Mike Mignola's original comic book, HELLBOY.
AICN held a big free screening of this flick last night at midnight. SXSW is going on at the moment, so between the badged SXSWers, the 400 plus free tickets handed out (good for two people each) plus the VIPs (like the AICN locals and local film people like Robert Rodriguez, who showed up with a good deal of his SIN CITY crew) the place was packed out... And we had bats. Oh yes, live bats that were circling the balcony of the beautiful old time movie house called the PARAMOUNT THEATRE. How more perfect can you get than that?
Guillermo brought Hellboy himself, Ron Perlman, and Hellboy creator Mike Mignola with him. It was their first time seeing the picture and even Guillermo's first time seeing everything completed on film. Matter of fact, the print (ran reel to reel) was so new that the studio hasn't even seen the picture yet! The energy at the Paramount was a tangible thing... Over a thousand excited geeks running on adrenaline and caffeine at midnight... I'm sure you get the picture...
Anyway, not too be too cheeky, but it was a helluva show. Guillermo introduced the picture in the only way Guillermo can... by talking about his new weight loss. "Soon I will be able to see my dick again!" That was only the tip of the iceberg! Gotta love how he gives an NC-17 opening speech to a PG-13 movie. That's Guillermo for ya'! I just thought it particularly funny because immediately to my left was a family with at least 4 kids around the age of 10.
Before I get into the review, I have to give a tad bit of my back history with HELLBOY... or my lack thereof. I've read only two Hellboy graphic novels and both of those were thanks to my good friend, Neil, who also introduced me to the wonders of PREACHER. Neil's as big a Hellboy fanatic as I've ever seen. I found it a little difficult to get into the first book, which if I remember correctly was SEED OF DESTRUCTION, but I went loopy for CONQUEROR WORM with the giant robot apes and floating nazi zombie heads in glass jars...
I also dug the hell out of the online comics I've seen. THE WOLVES OF ST. AUGUST was recommended to me by my buddy, Kraken, and that's by far my favorite Hellboy story so far. Hellboy Vs. Werewolf ghosts (or is it ghost werewolves? hehe)
In other words, I wasn't too firmly attached to the HELLBOY universe. I liked the majority of what I'd seen, but I've only really read a very small selection from the many HELLBOY stories out there.
The film kicks so much ass, guys. Del Toro plays to all the great base geek cornerstones. Tentacled Lovecraftian Gods, hot super-powered chicks, badass butt-kicking anti-hero, evil nazi zombie assassins, supernatural monsters and Baby Ruth addiction! It's all there!
I knew Guillermo could deliver great action. His stuff in BLADE 2 was fantastic comic-book/pound your fist in the air stuff. What came as a pleasant surprise was the character he sneaked into the film. Anyone who has seen his DEVIL'S BACKBONE or CRONOS, knows he can pull some masterful performances and great depth from his characters, even if they're in unbelievable situations.
I was very happy to see him kinda merge the comic-book action with the characterization of his smaller films. You can really feel Hellboy's love for Liz Sherman (played by the amazingly beautiful Selma Blair). You really can feel the love and respect he has for his father figure, played by the great John Hurt. Del Toro doesn't spend too much time centered on these storylines, but he was still able to bring them across and make them something more than just character ideas. He also gave Hellboy a few great human moments, which I won't spoil here, but you'll know 'em when you see 'em.
The trailers and TV spots for this film are great and I believe they will help drive the box office up to huge levels, but they do give away a lot of stuff that I would have preferred to have seen first in the context of the film. Not really that they really give away a lot of the plot, but the visuals. I never really felt that first grand awe of seeing Rick Baker's brilliant work with HELLBOY or Spectral Motion's equally brilliant work on Abe Sapien. Abe Sapien is fucking amazing. Hellboy is amazing looking. The saturation of them kinda lessened the impact of seeing them up on the screen together, but if that means this flick becomes a huge deal and makes bundles of money, then it was worth it.
The CG is good. It looks like CG in some scenes (especially with the baby Hellboy), but it never really bugged me. At the worst it felt comic booky and I was, afterall, watching a comic book movie.
The only thing I didn't love in the film was the score. I liked it. It fit. But I'm just thirsting for a great superhero theme. I would have loved to hear what someone like Basil Poledouris would have done... Think of a ROBOCOP type theme for HELLBOY and CONAN THE BARBARIAN type music during the fights with big tentacle dog thingies. Marco Beltrami (TERMINATOR 3, SCREAM) did the score, which like I said above is good. It's just not really a standout. No one left the theatre humming any music from the film.
Ron Perlman absolutely shines in the flick. He's forever been one of the best character actors around and a vastly underused talent. His raw badassness is unmatched at the moment. He was born to play HELLBOY. He IS HELLBOY!
The whole supporting cast was great... I'm in love with pyro chick, Liz Sherman. I adore Abe Sapien. I even got to like the human agent dude, who I was sure was going to disappear as a character, unable to keep my interest when surrounded by psychic fishmen, good guy hell spawn and giant tentacle monsters. He didn't... But my two favorite characters in the the film... well, they weren't who I expected them to be.
The first is Kroenen, the sweet as hell Nazi assassin who always wears those creepy-ass gasmasks! I want a toy of him from the beginning of the film, when he's decked out in his SS uniform and slick black gasmask! This dude was super fast, super cool and super deadly. Kroenen's the Darth Maul of the film. Sweet looking and cooler than the Fonze in a fridge. But unlike Darth Maul, Kroenen is actually in a good movie!
The second is that cool as shit "Speaker," the corpse that Hellboy raises to help guide him toward the end of the film. Pissed off dead Russian dude with a smart mouth and noose around his neck. My only complaint is that he leaves the film so quickly. I want more!
That's certainly the feeling after seeing the film... "I want more!" Matter of fact, when Guillermo took the stage at the end of the film he was greeted by a fan from the balcony shouting, "Sequel! Sequel!" I can't agree more. The characters are set up. They are super-badass and cool. Bring on the next one! Just make sure you give me my Werewolf Ghosts... or Ghost Werewolves. I'm not picky.
That's it from me, squirts! I better run or I'll miss tonight's screening of John Landis' new flick, the documentary SLASHER... I'll be back with my ongoing coverage of SXSW! 'Til that day, this is Quint bidding you all a fond farewell and adieu.
-Quint
email: Aw, CRAP! You can email Quint here!!!
